Free Diehl, William - Show of Evil by Unknown Page B

what's
interesting. It rained the night before, but there were no footprints
in the house and the porch was hosed down so there were no footprints
out there either. What I think, the perp took off his shoes when he
came in. Then when he left he hosed off the deck so there weren't any
out there, either. Probably used the hose to wash off the victim's
blood, too. I mean, you look at the pictures of Lincoln, the perp had
to be covered with blood.'
    'Yeah, somebody did some homework on this,' Flaherty said, still
flipping through the photographs. 'Whoever set up the victim knew Spier
and his wife were away. Little town like this - '
    'Was in the
Post-Dispatch
,' said Nicholson.
    'What was?'
    'About Spier and his wife going out to Vegas. A story in the people
section. He drives a semi, won a trip for ten years' service without a
citation or mishap.'
    'How about the package?'
    'Mailed from over in East St Louis, one of those wrap-and-send
places,' Jensen offered. 'During lunch hour. Place was jammed, nobody
remembers a damn thing about who posted it. Return name and address is
a phony.'
    Flaherty looked at the receipt slip. On the line that read 'sender'
was the name M. Lafferty.
    'Know an M. Lafferty?' the detective asked.
    'Nope,' Flaherty said. ' The victim picked it up himself, huh?'
    'Yeah. Was bellyaching about having to run over there after working
hours and then drive down here and back after dark.'
    'What about this

Twenty-one
    Jane Venable leaned over the spaghetti pot and, pursing her lips,
sucked a tiny sample of the olio off a wooden spoon.
Pretty good
,
she thought, and sprinkled a little more salt in it. She looked over at
the table. Earlier in the day the florist had brought an enormous
arrangement of flowers with a simple note: 'These cannot compare to
your beauty. Marty.'
    For the first time in years, Jane felt she was beginning to have a
new life outside of her office. She had made a fortune, but it had cost
her any semblance of a personal life. Now, in just a few days, that had
changed. She stared at the flowers and wondered silently, My
God,
am I falling in love with this man
? And just as quickly she
dispelled the idea.
It's just a flirtation, don't make more of it
than it
is .
    'I didn't think you really cooked in this chef's fantasy,' said
Vail. 'Where'd you learn to cook Italian spaghetti? You're not Italian.'
    'My mother was. Born in Florence. She was a translator at the
Nuremberg trials when she was eighteen.'
    'Ahhh, so that's where that tough streak came from.'
    'My father was no slouch, either. He was a government attorney at
the trials - that's where they met. And after that a federal prosecutor
for fifteen years.'
    'What did he think when you quit prosecuting and went private?'
    'He was all for it. He said ten years was enough unless I wanted to
move up to attorney general or governor. I didn't need that kind of
heat.'
    'Who does? There's damn little truth in politics.'
    'I don't know,' she said. 'When I was a prosecutor I honestly
believed it was all about truth and justice and all that
crap.'
    'I repeat, there's damn little truth in politics, Janie.'
    'You know what they say, truth is perception.'
    'No, truth is the
fury's
perception,' Vail corrected.
    'Does it ever bother you?' she asked. 'About winning?'
    'What do you mean?'
    'Some people say we're both obsessed with winning.'
    'It's all point of view. Listen, when I was a young lawyer I
defended a kid for ripping off a grocery store. The key piece of
evidence was a felt hat. The prosecutor claimed my boy dropped it
running out of the store. I tore up the prosecution, proved it couldn't
be his hat, ate up the eyewitnesses, turned an open-and-shut case into
a rout. After he was acquitted, the kid turns to me and says, "Can I
have my hat back now?" It bothered me so much that one night I was
having dinner with a judge - who later became one of my best friends -
and I told him what had happened. Know what he said? "It wasn't your
problem, it was the